Daphile

[steve_1979]

This looks interesting: http://www.daphile.com

I might nab one of the tiny air cooled Intel Atom based PC's from work to use as a music server (the IT guy says that they have several that aren't needed anymore so they'll just sit there gathering dust anyway). The PC's don't have a hard drive and make do with just a few gig of flash memory which is just enough to store an operating system for booting up with. If I loaded Daphine onto it, plugged in a USB memory stick with all my music and added an old 15" flat screen monitor (which can be picked up for free nowadays too). Hay presto, a free music server.

Whatdyathunk?

 

[SteveR750]

How much?

Apart from a USB driver, what does it do that j river or foobar doesn't? I think the USB driver is better written by the dac manufacturer anyway. If it's under £30 worth trying perhaps, but J River is around that price from new, and upgrades around £12 at current ex rates.

 

[steve_1979]

Daphile is free I think.

Hopefully I can probably blag everything that's needed to build a music server (both the hardware and software) for free. The computer part is tiny and can be mounted to the back of the monitor out of sight and provided I choose a smart looking black monitor the whole setup should look pretty good too.

 

[Vladimir]

A very clever solution.

 

[iQ Speakers]

Steve its headless OS you wont need a screen?

 

[sp]

Replaced my Squeezebox Touch with Daphile on an Intel NUC about a year ago. You don't need a monitor after setting up, the interface can be accessed from a browser. To my ears, it sounds better than my old SBT or my Mac as source. If you have a PC, give it a try, it's free.

 

[cheeseboy]

yup. Daphile is something I've been touting for a while. It's excellent. Basically it's a custom build of linux to only include the bits that are needed, thus cutting down any non essential services running in the background.

This also means you can use it on very low powered hardware.

Initially it's meant as a headless server - you use any Squeezebox controller on your tablet/phone to control it. It's got Tunein radio built in as well so you can use all of those thousands of radio streams, it will rip cd's etc and generally does everything you want it to.

And yes, it's free. No reason why not to try it as you can run it off a usb stick as well, so you don't need to wipe anything.

 

[cheeseboy]

Steve its headless OS you wont need a screen?

The newer version can be run with a screen so if you don't have a tablet/phone or whatever you can still use it like a standalone streamer people on here are so fond of

 

[steve_1979]

Steve its headless OS you wont need a screen?

The newer version can be run with a screen so if you don't have a tablet/phone or whatever you can still use it like a standalone streamer people on here are so fond of

That's good news.

 

[steve_1979]

The free computer from work doesn't have a digital optical output so it needs to be plugged into my USB DAC which is a less eligent solution.

My life is so hard and unfair.

 

[DocG]

The free computer from work doesn't have a digital optical output so it needs to be plugged into my USB DAC which is a less eligent solution.

My life is so hard and unfair.

They dole out free computers w i t h o u t optical out? Sue 'em!*aggressive*

 

[steve_1979]

Even the free coffee they give us tastes horrible and I have to take my own in if I want a good cuppa.

 

[dantt]

It is indeed a very good solution to play music,for me is the best.I used Daphile for about 4 months from intel nuc (celeron version).I have a Hegel H80 amp/dac conected to nuc via usb and i control it with smartphone(android version) with squeezbox application.The sound is very good with no diference from foobar or jriver.Very convenient and free.